Asteroids Comets Meteor Showers (Meteorites – we’ll skip). Asteroids. After discovery of Uranus, astronomers wondered if there were other "unknown" planets - anything between Mars and Jupiter? Major motivation was the Titius-Bode Law. Titius-Bode law.

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Asteroids Comets Meteor Showers (Meteorites – we’ll skip)

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Asteroids After discovery of Uranus, astronomers wondered if there were other "unknown" planets - anything between Mars and Jupiter? Major motivation was the Titius-Bode Law.

Titius-Bode law • In the 1700s, scientists tried to describe the Solar System mathematically, especially the distances of the planets from the Sun • Dplanet=0.4+0.3N (AU) where N=0,1,2,4,8 (doubles for each planet). This is Titius-Bode Law.

What are asteroids? • Small, rocky objects (not planets – haven’t cleared out their path. Only Ceres is spherical and is also a dwarf planet). • Largest asteroids and naming scheme: 1 Ceres 975 km diameter 2 Pallas 522 km 3 Juno 248 km 4 Vesta 549 km Number before name indicates order discovered. >300,000 found. 100,000 have measured orbits. Most of the mass is in ones with D=100-200 km, but many smaller ones exist.

Jupiter's effect • Perhaps a planet was going to form there, but Jupiter’s pull disrupted orbits of planetesimals, ejecting some completely, preventing formation of planet. Asteroids are leftovers. • Supported by simulations. If no Jupiter, an Earth-like planet likely to form. With Jupiter, orbits are disrupted. Kirkwood gaps Caused by resonances with Jupiter’s orbital period. Where asteroids would have periods which are in simple fractions of Jupiter’s period, they are cleared out of that orbit. Where have we seen this before?

Collisions • Hirayama families - several groups of asteroids have nearly identical orbits. • Result from the breakup of larger asteroids through high speed collisions.

Many asteroids have densities typical of rock. But many others have densities 1-2 g cm-3 - cannot be solid rock. Example, Mathilde (density = 1.3 g cm-3). Presumably it is a porous “rubble pile” from a low speed collision. Collisions fragmented it, but gravity of fragments brought them back together. Other collisions may lead to “moons” like Dactyl around Ida. Mathilde Ida and Dactyl NEAR Shoemaker 1997 Galileo 1993

Asteroids and the Earth • Asteroids whose orbits cross the orbits of Earth and other inner planets: NEOs • About 2500 “near-Earth asteroids” known – but collisions with Earth are rare. • Small bits do fall to Earth as meteors or meteorites. Meteors come in two kinds – sporadic and shower. The sporadic meteors are asteroid pieces. Showers are related to comets.

Aristotle thought comets were atmospheric phenomena: • Unusual clouds in the Earth's atmosphere. • Could not be part of the perfect & unchanging heavenly realm. • Renaissance astronomers began more systematic studies: • Observed that tails always point away from the Sun, suggesting cosmic phenomena. • Tycho Brahe measured the parallax of the great comet of 1577 & showed it orbited the Sun.

In 1705, Edmund Halley computed orbit of the comet of 1682 using Newton's laws. Got 76 yrs. • Would explain comets seen in 1531 & 1607. • => predicted it would return in 1758. • Seen on 12/5/1758, 12 years after Halley's death. • Orbital properties: • Elliptical orbit, e=0.97 • Semimajor axis, a=17.9 AU, with aphelion at 35 AU, and perihelion at 0.6 AU. • Period is 74-79 years. • Retrograde orbit. Suggests its orbit has been modified.

Two types of comets • Long-period comets (P>200 years) • Very elliptical orbits, random inclinations to ecliptic, equally likely to be prograde or retrograde • Many have periods of millions of years. Then orbit sizes are >104 AU. • Over 3000 known • Short-period comets (P<200 years) • Elliptical orbits close to ecliptic, most have inclinations < 30°, mostly prograde • Almost 500 known • From periods, orbit sizes are about that of Kuiper Belt.

Origin of comets • Short period: from the Kuiper Belt (30-50AU) • Gravitationally deflected into inner parts of Solar System by close encounters with Neptune • Long-period: from the hypothesized “Oort cloud”…

Comet Structure Nucleus: “dirty snowball” of ices and small rocky particles. 99% of the mass. But hard to see. Comet composition is different from asteroids. Parts visible to eye or telescope: coma - low density gas/dust cloud H envelope (only seen in UV) dust tail - whitish ion tail - bluish (emission from C-bearing molecules). Coma and tails only seen when comet within about 1 AU of Sun. Most of orbit, comet is just nucleus.

Tails are produced when ices sublimate. Gas or ion tails point directly away from sun, blown back by solar wind. Dust tails curve as the liberated particles begin their own individual orbits. Tails can be 108 km long.

Comet nuclei are loosely packed due to outgassing of ices as a result of solar heating. Eventually should break apart into many pieces. Comet LINEAR Thus lifetime of comets coming close to Sun is limited. For example, Halley loses 10 tons/sec when near Sun. Will be destroyed in 40,000 years.

Main results: High-temperature minerals that should form close to Sun are abundant in the tail. Somehow these were pushed to outer solar nebula. Amino acid glycine found. Building blocks of proteins. How much in amino acids did comets deliver to Earth? Stardust mission collected sample from comet Wild 2 in January 2004, landed 15 January 2006. Was brought to Johnson Space Flight Center for study.

Meteor Showers Shredded nucleus debris eventually spreads out along orbit. Fragmentation of Comet LINEAR IF Earth's orbit crosses comet orbit, get annual meteor shower, as fragments burn up in atmosphere.